I’m not much of a flower person, but when I met my husband, he was working for a landscaping company. The first flower he ever brought me was a pink Gerbera daisy plant. We weren’t dating yet, but I was hooked. On him and the flowers. In our seven years of marriage, we’ve yet to have a place to call our own, so I haven’t given much thought to lawn care and landscaping and gardens and flowers.
Until last year when we moved to a 19th century farmhouse now surrounded by commercial properties. For me, it’s a tiny bit of Eden (the name of a nearby township) in the midst of a business district, and our landlord has given us license with the yard.
Spring has been fun this year as we watch the yard burst with color. First, daffodils, then lilacs, now roses and some kind of dogwood, soon hyndrageas. Long before we lived here, someone thought to fill this space with beauty. 
And I am grateful.
At the house we moved from, our landlord neighbors tended the flowers and the yard, sometimes with drastic measures. A few trees and bushes that graced the yard when we moved in gradually were removed completely until all we were left with was a towering conifer in the backyard that was sometimes stingy with its shade.
Still, it was something. But it also reflected that season of our lives.
Read the rest of my monthly post at Putting on the New here.
[…] never owned a home, this space is the first one we’ve wanted to take care of like it is ours. I’ve told you how my husband likes to take care of the yard. He doesn’t have to. We don’t have to. But we want to. (And if we live here long […]